English, Dimozantos fastest on big day out

Riders left the Snowy Mountains for a gruelling 90km competitive stage followed by a 40km cruise into Bermagui on the NSW South Coast. Combined, the two stages made for a big day out.

The day started with a loop around the Cooma Racetrack and then a ride through the Monaro Plains to the previously unridden climb of Numeralla Mountain and on down the escarpment through the spectacular rainforest of Wadbilliga National Park.

Excitement was the order of the day, with Andy Blair leading the race stage most of the way, only to be passed by Jason English within the last 10km. English completed the 90km in 3:27:50, a minute and half ahead of Blair 3:29:25. Nicolas Menager came in third in 3:30:50.

Today's win by English extended his overall lead to nine minutes and 21 seconds with an overall time of 9:35:20. Blair has completed the 340km thus far in 9:44:41 and is six minutes and 13 seconds ahead of Andrew Fellows whose time is 9:50:54.

On a challenging day of deep river crossings and loose rock descents, Megan Dimozantos managed to draw ahead of Belinda Porter. Dimozantos took 4:27:35 to complete the race stage, with Porter over 13 minutes later. Clare Lonergan came in third eight minutes further back.

Porter is now more than 26 minutes behind Dimomzantos, whose overal time is 12:51:14. Lonergan is still in third place overall at 13:48:05, more than half an hour behind Porter.

The best effort of the day went to Greg Seaegg who late Wednesday night wasn't going to ride the race stage as he thought it was going to be too hard and he wouldn't make the cutoff. However, he completed the stage 10 minutes prior to cutoff and has every reason to be pleased with himself tonight. While Seaegg was finishing Stage 9, the front end of the pack had finished Stage 10, the cruise from Yowrie to Bermagui.

Racers will face the final day tomorrow, a 50km Surf Safari. While the results appear set, anything could happen on the race up the coast to Narooma, with river crossings, beach riding (pushing?) and tides to take into account. One small miscalculation could see riders lose valuable minutes to their closest competitors.

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